The End of the Beginning
by Objessions
Summary: Sequel to What Remains, a continuation of my (mostly) in cannon pre-series series. Mac has graduated from spy school, he's a full fledged DXS agent, and O'Neill is still in the wind. How will our hero and his best friend take out the man who's been a nightmare for Mac since his earliest days in the Army? As always, I own nothing, but I do like to imagine stuff blowing up.
1. Chapter 1

The End of the Beginning

_Sequel to What Remains_

"Jack! Get down!" Mac whisper-shouted. He crouched down somewhat stiffly, moving carefully between the large dusty crates and old wine racks, in case Jack missed when he'd squeezed off a shot at the guy who'd followed them.

Predictably, Jack ignored him, slinking closer to the almost-overhead double doors by the crumbling basement stairs. Mac rolled his eyes but started to move in the same direction.

A moment before, Mac felt damn near panicked when he'd seen the hulking shadows of what Jack called Corwin Carlisle's Brute Squad, lumber past the filthy basement window. In an unforgivable (to Mac anyway) rookie mistake, he'd gotten made when they were tracking Carlisle and picked up by his bodyguards. He'd spent a couple of very unpleasant hours in their company before Jack found an opening to break him out.

Exfil was on its way, along with a DXS team prepared to snap up the whole crew and shut down their facility. DXS might not have gotten a location if they hadn't grabbed Mac, but Mac wasn't quite ready to give himself credit for them finding the bioweapon manufacturing operation hidden behind Carlisle title on family land in what should have been friendly territory but felt pretty freaking hostile just now.

What they needed to do (per orders from Thornton) was lay low until the larger team arrived, probably in about an hour. What Jack was actually doing was planning to sneak back out of this grubby basement and take out as many of the goons as he had ammo for.

Jack said it was to make things easier for the clean-up crew. Mac suspected it was more to do with the fact that a good number of them had entertained themselves beating the hell out of Jack's partner for a while. Jack was taking that rather personally, although he credited Mac getting nabbed as a brilliant plan to get them the location just as readily as Thornton had when they spoke to her briefly on Jack's phone. Jack was complicated that way, Mac supposed.

Finally Jack stopped on his forward progress toward the doors and waited for Mac to catch up. He held up a hand that told the younger man unquestionably to keep quiet. Mac scowled and hissed, "You can't go out there, Jack. Thornton said to lay low until the team gets here."

Jack gave him a look. He whispered, "She meant you."

Mac rolled his eyes. "She meant both of us!"

"Shhh!" Jack's eyes flicked toward the basement door. "They are right outside right now, kid. Unless you'd like to go back to not answering their less than polite questions while they tenderize your insides, I need you to be quiet and stay put."

Now that Jack had pointed it out, he could hear the men outside, and remembered seeing their shadows pass the window above his head on the other side of this cellar. He puffed out a long breath. He was definitely feeling the effects of the beating he'd been subjected to. But, he reasoned, it wasn't so bad that he was interested in hanging back while Jack went out and kicked the asses of the guys who'd roughed him up. "Okay, but if you're gonna do something stupid, you gotta let me help."

Jack flashed a grin and shook his head. "You're more beat up than you've slowed down enough to realize, kid." Mac started to protest, but Jack talked right over him. "And you haven't been doing this for long enough that you can just go up there and act on instinct. You're the asset. I protect you. That's how this goes. Okay?"

"Jack …" he began.

"Besides, you might not hear it, but there's a bird comin' in." Mac shook his head. He didn't hear it, but he had to admit his ears were ringing on and off, so that didn't mean much. "So that means one of two things. Either DXS is here and things are gonna get colorful for a few minutes. Or Carlisle called in reinforcements and …"

"Things are gonna get _really _colorful," Mac finished.

"Yup," Jack agreed. "And you are already really colorful. As in one giant bruise."

Mac rolled his eyes again, but he could hear someone fumbling with the lock on the cellar doors. "Fine. I'll stay put, so long as you don't get yourself in the weeds out there."

Jack grinned. "And what're you gonna do about it if I do?"

Mac returned the grin. "Improvise."

That was probably as good as he was going to get out of the young agent, so Jack gave a nod as he unscrewed the suppressor from his pistol, preferring increased penetrating power over stealth at this point in the game. The sound of the helicopter … make that helicopters, plural, was much closer. But so was the sound of voices and the give of the padlock on the doors. "Alright, kid. I'm goin' up."

Jack tipped his chin in the direction of a large crate. Mac rolled his eyes again, but ducked behind it, out of sight. He involuntarily crouched lower as the doors were pulled open and Jack rushed the group with a battle cry that Mac was 90% sure was, "Yipikayay!" in full, colorful, John McClane fashion. He couldn't be positive though because the immediate sounds of gunfire set his ears ringing again.

After a minute or two, the ringing subsided somewhat as the gunfire got further away. Unable to tolerate not knowing exactly what was going on, Mac edged toward the stairs. He hazarded a look out the doors when he was pretty sure he'd heard someone shout his name.

His first thought was one of relief. The helicopters were DXS. So reinforcements had arrived. His second thought was mostly swear words, because while the good guys were sweeping out in all directions after Carlisle's people, at least one group of them was pinned down over by a large but ancient stone water trough, taking fire from a small group of Carlisle's security people who were holed up behind the nearby carriage barn.

All of DXS's people seemed pretty damned busy, and Mac could tell from the infrequency and careful nature of the return fire that the small group was running out of ammo. If Jack (and he had to assume it was Jack) had yelled for him, it meant the time had come to improvise.

Mac jogged back down the basement stairs, ignoring the various aches and pains he was quickly coming to associate with just about any mission. He started to look around in the low light for something that might fit the bill.

He tripped over an old tarp and careened into a full, albeit impossibly dusty wine rack. Several of the bottles fell off into the floor, smashing and releasing the scent of good red wine into the dank air. For a split second he brain danced away to last weekend with Nikki, where dinner and a movie had definitely turned into Netflix and chill. He had a pretty good idea that if they made it home he could probably expect a sequel, too. That was surprisingly motivating.

_Not a lot down here. These wine bottles are promising though. _He picked one up. _It's been a long time since I made a bottle rocket … but maybe … _

Mac looked around some more. He'd never made a rocket out of a wine bottle. He wasn't sure enough that it would work.

_Maybe a Molotov Cocktail would do the trick. _Mac started looking around for things he could use as a wick. _See, Molotov Cocktails originated after the start of World War II when the Russians invaded Finland. Vyacheslav Molotov, their Foreign Minister, had explosives dropped on civilian targets. He called them bread baskets. The Finns took that a little personally and started making firebombs to throw at the invaders, calling them "a drink to go with Molotov's bread". Pretty soon everyone was calling improvised fire bombs Molotov Cocktails. Ideally, you'd build them with petroleum distillates of some type, but in a pinch, any alcohol that will burn will do._

Mac had the sudden depressing suspicion that the wine would not be high enough proof to burn properly. "Damn it," he grumbled, his improvised solution evaporating before his eyes.

He crouched and tried to light some of the wine from the broken bottles. When it caught, but then immediately went out, he swore again, with a little more heat this time. He started frantically searching around for something else. He started taking tarps off storage crates, cursing more when all any of them seemed to contain was dusty old antiques.

He grinned suddenly when he pulled another top off an already open crate and found most of a case of Plymouth Navy Gin.

_Now that I can use. _

Mac got to work uncapping bottles, pouring some liquid out, and stuffing torn bits of his shirt down the necks to act as wicks.

_Plymouth Gin is traditionally over 100 proof. The British navy insisted on it, back when they were the world's greatest sea power. Mostly because it was used both for the officers for drinking and the sailors for lighting things on fire. To be fair, they probably drank it, too. And it makes one hell of a martini, but right now I'm definitely more interested in it's properties as an incendiary. Gotta love some of the weird naval knowledge Gramps passed along._

Mac dashed back over to the stairs, carrying an armload of the bottles. He quickly lit them and flung them at the carriage barn. He saw bursts of flame and heard swearing and screaming, so he knew he'd been at least partially successful. The pinned down team of DXS agents, given a little breathing room, were able to move and they quickly subdued that last band of holdouts.

It wasn't very long before Jack jogged over grinning from ear to ear. "Thanks for the save, kid. As far as improvising goes, I think that was some of your best work."

"Thanks, man. Glad it worked. I was ready to try it with old wine but I think all that would have done was gotten the bad guys wet. Good thing Carlisle likes more than one traditional beverage I guess." Now that the action was over he felt just a little shaky, although he wasn't ready to admit, even to himself, that that was the case or why it might be either.

Jack patted him on the shoulder. "Remind me to buy you a traditional beverage when we get home, huh?"

"Hell yeah," Mac agreed. Home sounded really good. His smile slipped for a second, but he caught it, got it firmly back in place before Jack noticed. "Let's get the hell out of here so we can get to that sooner rather than later, pal."

"You bet, kid."

Mac was quiet on the helicopter and, if such a thing were possible, quieter still on the jet. He let the medic give him a cursory once over without saying much of anything. He just sipped a bottled water and stared out the window at the clouds, answering Jack briefly when he asked a question, but preferring to let Jack's gentle chatter crowd out his thoughts rather than engaging much.

A couple hours into the flight, Mac said he was beat and curled up on the couch with the medic's blessing. At least the kid came away without a concussion or any loose teeth. Jack figures he knew why Mac had gotten so introspective once the excitement was over. The kid had gotten nabbed. Jack was pretty sure he'd done it on purpose when it all went down, but seeing how Mac was pulling inside himself, now he wasn't so sure. Mac's distressed mumbling in his sleep confirmed that it had dragged up his captivity with O'Neill.

It never escalated into real nightmare territory, so Jack just let him sleep. Once Mac seemed to be out more deeply, Jack even napped himself. One of the staff woke them both on their approach to the private landing field just outside Los Angeles. Another short helicopter ride landed them on the roof of DXS headquarters.

To their surprise, Director Thornton was waiting for them by the elevator doors. "Nice work, gentleman."

"Thank you, ma'am," Mac said with a modest nod.

"Did you expect anything less, Patty?" Jack asked with a grin and a wink.

"Of course not. You two are the rising stars at DXS. As I said, well done."

The elevator doors opened, but Thornton stayed in front of them, holding them open, but keeping the team from boarding.

"Something you need, Director?" Jack asked, hoping his return to formality would get her to the point. Mac was all kinds of antsy and this wasn't helping.

"Actually yes. Normally, I'd send you both home and have you come back tomorrow for the debrief …"

"Which would be great, cuz I think we could both use a shower and a hot meal." Jack's tone indicated that time off was essential. He wanted Mac to have a chance to kind of process what he was feeling before anything new got thrown at them.

"By all means, go have a shower and get changed. You both have things in your lockers, correct?" They nodded, both frowning a little. This wasn't the way things usually went. "After that, Mac I want you to head over to Medical. The medic thinks it's possible you earned yourself some cracked ribs from Carlisle's men."

Mac shook his head. "I'm fine, Director Thornton. What is it you …"

"I'm sure you are, Mac. But do me a favor and go let Medical rule out any breaks for you. It'll make the after action report more complete and less likely to garner scrutiny from Oversight."

Mac suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. Oversight was turning out to be a real pain in the ass. Having a boss was bad enough, but having a boss's boss, that had never even met you, that wouldn't speak to you directly, constantly handing down orders and complicating your already complicated life was almost more than he'd bargained for.

"Yes, ma'am," was what he said instead of any of that though.

"Then I'd like you to both meet me in the War Room. I'll have dinner sent up."

"What's up, Patty?" Jack asked, feeling a tingle of excitement. He liked his life unpredictable, and God knew the last year had just seen it getting better and better in that regard.

"There's something I'd like you to see. If you'd like, you can consider it a reward for your good work in England."

"A reward?" Mac asked.

"We believe we've found O'Neill's latest encampment."

Mac sucked in his breath a little. That was big.

"If we can confirm it, I'd like your ops team to lead the mission to retrieve him. If you'd like, that is."

Nightmares, fatigue, aches and pains, and even hunger were immediately forgotten. Mac's eyes caught fire.

"Director Thornton, you can count on it."


	2. Chapter 2

Mac was still getting used to the War Room. The multiple screens, overlaid with images similar to a heads up display, the flashing data on all sides … it's was a lot to process. And normally his agile mind enjoyed it.

Right now, however, he couldn't focus on any of it. He'd sort of checked out after Thornton put up the first satellite photos. The earliest images confirmed, to Mac who swore he'd know the set of the man's shoulders from a million miles away anyway, that O'Neill had been at the camp in Libya. The most recent ones indicated that he'd departed though. That meant he was out there again. Waiting for a chance to strike.

That was enough to distract anybody. Especially the guy who'd spent years having nightmares about leaving him behind in a war zone, only to find out he was a traitor, and be captured and tortured by the man. Combine Mac's general discomfort over all that coming up for him with Thornton's detailed descriptions of the technical aspects of the intelligence gathering, and it wasn't long before Mac's brain was off woolgathering. He was on edge about O'Neill and kind of bored with the tech talk. Computers were not really his thing. He was competent with them, but not overly interested.

So instead of listening to Thornton, Mac was contemplating the smart glass that made up most of the walls of the war room. He had discovered that it worked through an electrostatic liquid crystal mechanism that aligned or scattered the crystals depending on the level of opacity you needed. He was pretty sure he could rig something up on the picture window in their living room and was taking a mental inventory of the garage, deciding if he needed to stop at the hardware store in the way home.

His pleasant reverie was interrupted by Thornton's deceptively pleasant query, "Which option appeals to you, Mac?"

He startled just a little. "Um …" He racked his brain for what she'd said leading up to her question. Unfortunately, he came up empty. "Whatever you think is best, Director Thornton," he hedged, hoping whatever she said next would offer some clue as to where the conversation had been.

The way one corner of her mouth twitched he knew he'd blown it. "No preference at all?" she prompted.

The perfect response occurred to him. "I'm interested in what you think, Director Thornton."

He heard Jack mumble something that sounded almost like a warning, but didn't look his way. Thornton blinked. He couldn't tell if she was annoyed or not though. "Well, personally, I wouldn't want someone else making a decision like this for me," she said very seriously, giving him a look of what he interpreted as intense concern.

"I …" He cleared his throat. Doubling down, his shoulders squared and his jaw firmed just a little. "I wasn't asking you to decide, just what your opinion was," he replied with what he thought was more than believable confidence.

Silence hung in the air for a long moment.

Mac resisted the urge to shift uncomfortably, but couldn't quite stop nervously scratching his jaw. He forced his hand quickly back to his lap though.

Thornton's lips curled up on one side. "I'd prefer to send out for sushi myself, but I seem to recall you're not all that enthusiastic about fish."

_God. Damn. It. Of course all she was asking about was dinner. What the hell else would the boss, who was apparently somebody who could make any spy in the world shake in their boots, ask a junior agent, who was already getting a reputation for being a little impulsive and unlikely to stick to the script, about. _He hoped he kept all that off his face. He shrugged. "I don't mind it. Soft shell crab is alright."

The other side of her mouth joined the first in what could only be interpreted as a highly amused smile from the boss and Jack chuckled audibly. "Told ya he wasn't listnin'," Jack drawled.

Mac threw him a half-hearted glare. Then he returned his gaze to Thornton. "I … um … I apologize, Director." She didn't offer anything so he went on. "I suppose I'm still getting the hang of this. The data gathering and computer aspects of the operation are a bit beyond me and …"

"And you got distracted by general boredom listening to them."

"Oh, no, ma'am!" he hurried to assure her, despite the fact that what she said was absolutely true. But she clearly knew he hadn't heard a word she'd said for a while so he figured he'd better try to cover his ass. "I was trying to recall the reading on the subject and I can get very much lost in my thoughts bringing that sort of thing up word for word in my memory."

Her smile didn't waver. "That's alright, MacGyver. You needed bother with trying to master it, so long as you have a general understanding. Given that neither you nor Jack are particularly inclined toward the computer-based end of things, I'm assigning you an analyst."

Jack frowned. "Patty, ain't watching out for one nerd enough for somebody like me? And don't say you'll give us somebody else from tactical. Last time we had two security folks we almost had us a real nasty friendly fire incident."

Mac was about to agree when Thornton cleared her throat. "I'm giving you someone who can handle themselves in the field and who doesn't share MacGyver's aversion to firearms."

"I don't know that I want …" Mac began.

"Nikki Carpenter will be joining your team, effective immediately." Thornton paused.

"Oh," Mac said softly, feeling a blush creep up his neck.

Jack laughed openly this time. "Well, I guess I'm on my own if I wanna lodge a protest about this one"

Mac ran a hand through his hair. "Well, tech help would be nice …"

"Sure," Jack laughed. "For you. Bet you wouldn't be so agreeable if she'd assigned that Knight kid from her department."

Mac's shrug was convincing, but his increase in color robbed it of some of its believability. "Josh is alright." He paused. "But he's not exactly the most physical analyst DXS has got. He might not fit in with a field team. Especially one that likes to move as fast as we do."

"Mmm, that's what's up," Jack said with a double raise of his eyebrows.

"Shut up, Jack," Mac groused with a roll of his eyes.

"Since how you felt about a new team member was actually my original question and it seems the answer is 'just fine' …" Mac didn't think it was possible to blush more, but here he was, ears burning. "I'll actually ask what you'd prefer I have sent up since Nikki will be joining us shortly so I can brief all three of you on an unrelated mission."

Mac forced a smile to cover his slight embarrassment. It wasn't forbidden to work with your girlfriend at DXS but it was sort of embarrassing when everyone in the room seemed to know the nature of that relationship. "I'm really not picky, ma'am. So long as you don't let Jack play field chef with some questionable MREs I can eat pretty much anything."

"Duly noted," she said, cocking an eyebrow at Jack that clearly communicated that she wanted to hear the MRE story. "Now, Mac, if you hurry, you can probably be back while your meal is still hot."

Mac blinked. "Hurry where, Director?"

"To Medical. As previously ordered."

"I went straight to Medical earlier," he protested.

"Well, you signed in, certainly."

"So I went!"

"But you didn't stay to be evaluated or treated," Thornton observed with slightly amused disapproval.

Mac sighed. "They were really busy. Anton's team came in with … I don't know, but infectious disease people got involved … I was in the way."

Thornton was sympathetic but still amused. "And?"

Mac flushed again. "And your new nurse yelled at me." He paused. "She … She kinda kicked me out. Sort of."

"I … I can actually see that." Thornton snorted a little laugh. She glanced the the clock. "She's off duty now."

"So what do you ..?"

"Head back down there and actually let them check you over. I'll hold dinner for you and …"

"Ma'am?"

"And if you hurry, I'll hold the briefing so you can join us, even if you have to wait for imaging."

"Ma'am?" he asked again.

"I mean Nikki will be heat when you get back." She smiled. "So shake a leg."

Mac managed a grin. "Yes, ma'am."

He rose and hustled out the door.

Jack smirked. "You're good, Patty."

Patricia Thornton smiled her Cheshire Cat smile.

"Count on it."


	3. Chapter 3

Jack looked up from his take out when Mac came back through the door. _Uh oh, the kid does not look happy._

Other than Jack and a mountain of take out, Thornton's office was empty. Mac tossed a folder onto her desk and flopped gracelessly down in on of her leather chairs puffing out an irritated sigh. Pretty sure he already knew the answer, Jack shoveled in some more lo mein with his chopsticks, put his feet up on another chair, and asked casually, "How'd it go, kid?"

"Fine," he said, sounding less than a hundred percent genuine. He reached for the fried rice and a set of chopsticks. "Where's everybody else?"

"You mean where's Nikki," Jack grinned.

A sliver of a smile flashed before his face resumed its slightly disgruntled lines. "I'm actually more interested in talking to Thornton at the moment. If I'm gonna get bounced anyway I'd rather take off now and go have a beer."

"Bounced? You okay, kid? You told me you were okay," Jack said, unable to keep a slight accusation out of his voice.

Mac sighed. "I'm fine, Jack. Ribs are just bruised. Hell, most of me is a little bruised," he admitted. But it's nothing an ice pack and a couple Tylenol won't take care of." Jack's head tilted in an inquisitive expression. "Foster was on duty."

Jack grinned a little. "He holler at you, too?"

Mac smirked and shook his head. "Recommended modified duty for four to six weeks though," he grumped.

"For bruised ribs?" Jack asked, slightly incredulous. He kept to himself that he thought Mac would have had the same reaction to the unpopular doctor even if his ribs had been busted wide open and that bruised ribs, in his experience anyway, hurt nearly as much as broken ones. "That seems kind of …"

"Ridiculous," Mac finished for him. "Same shit as when my shoulder was healing a couple months ago. If Doc Anderson hadn't been on duty when I applied for clearance I'd probably still be in freaking physical therapy for that!" He sighed again. "Foster just has it out for me."

"At least he didn't yell at you like the new chick," Jack commiserated.

"On balance I'll take bossy new nurses who like to yell over the asshole that can wreck my life for months at a time by sticking me on desk duty."

"Who's wrecking your life?" Thornton asked as she breezed back into the room.

Mac looked around hopefully. _No Nikki. Huh._ _And she overheard some of our conversation. Great. _"No one, hopefully, ma'am." Mac got up, careful to keep his movements easy and fluid. He picked up the folder from her desk and handed it directly to her. _How to put this diplomatically … _"I'm concerned that Dr. Foster's … um … over abundance of caution … could cause some difficulties for the upcoming mission you mentioned earlier."

A half smile he was learning to recognize as genuinely amused quirked up the corners of her lips. "Over abundance of caution? Let's see."

Mac made himself sit back down. He thought it looked more confident (mostly because if he was sitting he wouldn't do that shifting from one foot to the other thing that Penny said always gave him away when he was 'fudging the truth'). Thornton opened the folder and read over the paper form that Foster still insisted on using even though she'd told him repeatedly she preferred these things be communicated electronically for experience sake. She raised her eyes to surreptitiously look at her youngest agent.

Mac was valiantly trying not to fidget, although he was screwing and unscrewing the cap to his water bottle restlessly. His posture of almost too straight, his shoulders too square. His jaw was tight and he had yet to return the smile she'd offered him. Tense and defensive and trying hard not to be either. For once she was grateful Don Foster hadn't acknowledged it was the 21st century and filed this visit summary in their computer system.

She put the folder down and sat behind her desk. "You think four to six weeks of restrictions is too cautious?"

Mac swallowed but nodded. "Yes, ma'am, I do. I'm fine."

She leaned back, gracefully crossing her legs. "Despite the fact that bruised ribs take that amount of time to heal?"

A line formed across his forehead and Mac sat forward. Someone less trained wouldn't have heard the increase in volume but Jack did. Because he knew Mac. So did Thornton. Because she was just that good. "But they're not dangerous even now. That's just how long they take to not hurt."

He paused, realizing he was nearly off the edge on his seat. He sat back, only looking about a third as on edge as he was. He felt strongly that he shouldn't be this irritated, but that didn't help him get on top of the feeling. He'd tried to have a reasonable discussion with the doctor when his xrays came back clean, but Foster had done the unforgivable. He'd snapped, "If you're going to be careless and get injured, be prepared to deal with the consequences like an adult. Or get better at hiding it." Nothing like directly quoting your dad at you from one of your least stellar pre-adolescent moments to make you feel like a goddamned kid who still needed to prove themselves.

He took a deep breath. "No one ever promises this job was going to be comfortable, Director Thornton. And," here he tipped her his best charming smile. "At this point in my life I'm pretty comfortable with uncomfortable." She didn't respond. "I just want to work, ma'am. Being a little sore isn't going to get in my way."

Finally, Jack contributed his own two cents. "He more than held his own at the end of that op, Patty.

Four of us were totally pinned down and he's the one who got us clear. Kid hadn't even had an aspirin after hours of gettin' whaled on by Carlisle's Brute Squad and he saved our asses. Benchin' him for that on the word of Don Foster would be downright dumb."

Mac flashed him a grateful smile but didn't say anything else, just eyed the boss a little warily. "Fortunately for you I am both more reasonable than Don and more lenient with my field-ready standards than the boss." Mac practically held his breath waiting for her to finish. "And fortunately he still doesn't know how to use the new e-record keeping system, so this report isn't finalized. I'll have him amend it to reflect recommendations to maximize your effectiveness in the field rather than keeping you out of it. His assistant won't file it without my signature anyway."

Mac's shoulders sagged with relief. After dealing with being benched with his shoulder a few months ago, he thought he might go crazy sitting behind a desk again so soon. He also thought if work was going to remind him of the unpleasant parts of his childhood he'd rather go back to fixing cars. "Thank you, Director Thornton. I appreciate that."

She typed something into her laptop at lightning speed. Then she returned her attention to Mac and Jack. "So, what do you know about biological weapons?"

Jack groaned, "Ah, Hell."

Mac grinned, game for just about anything.

"Not much, ma'am. But I'm very interested in learning."


	4. Chapter 4

Prior to working at DXS, Mac had only ever flown on military transports or Coach on commercial flights. Even when he'd come back from Afghanistan via the DXS jet, he'd been pretty beat, medicated, and too in his own head to take in the luxurious accommodations. Even on the few missions he'd been on since graduating from the required clandestine services training, he'd either had to fly commercial or flown on other organization's aircraft.

At the moment though, Mac was appreciating just exactly how interested in providing a comfortable trip Thornton appeared to be. He didn't really love to fly, and the handful of Advil he'd downed was only just taking the edge off the pain in his torso, and the only times he'd ever really slept in the air he'd been injured and medicated.

But the couch was extremely comfortable, the meal the crew served them had been exceptionally fine, and he was exhausted from their last mission. At least the Advil has dulled the rest of the aches Carlisle's men had gifted him with. After he finished his third run through of the building schematics and other briefing materials Thornton sent along, he decided it was time to follow some advice Jack had been giving him since their first mission. He curled up on his side and closed his eyes.

He lay under a soft blanket, dozing pleasantly, listening to the sound of Nikki's fingers flying over the keys of her laptop and the gentle drone of Jack telling amusing (and potentially embarrassing) stories about their Army days since she was a captive audience.

Mac contemplated opening his eyes and calling bullshit on Jack's very one-sided retelling of their first meeting, but decided it wasn't that important. If they were going to inspect an infectious disease research facility for illicit activity, he needed all his faculties. Which meant, frankly, he needed some rest. He pulled the blanket up a little further around his head to muffle their conversation and let the drone of the engines and his general exhaustion lull him into a fitful sleep.

When he bolted upright a couple of hours later, Jack was leaning over him, clearly about to try to wake him. His blanket was on the floor, so he knew he'd been thrashing. He was sweaty and flushed, too. Then he realized Nikki was staring at him with wide eyes from across the cabin and the heat in his face increased by at least an order of magnitude. Before he even opened his mouth he vowed silently that he was never going to fall asleep in front of her again as long as he lived.

He was determined to brush off whatever they'd seen. Besides was was not about to contemplate, say nothing of confess aloud, his dream of stumbling through endless hallways, unbroken by doors or windows, or the sounds of torment in all to recognizable voices that seeped through the cracks. And nothing, not the pain or torture or Jack and Bozer's most relentless hovering, would get him to admit (even to himself) the faces and voices of the monsters that chased him there.

He sat up fully, swinging his feet off the couch, and running his hands over his face and through his hair. Jack casually sat down next to him, blocking the view between him and Nikki, though whether that move was intentional or not, Mac wasn't sure. Jack opened his mouth to say something. Mac forestalled conversation by bending to retrieve his blanket. Mother Nature cooperated with his efforts to save face by shaking the jet with an epic bout of turbulence. As he was sitting back up, Jack finally spoke, loud enough for Nikki to hear.

"Turbulence almost knocked you off the couch, kid. Figured you wouldn't want that jostling you awake so I was gonna poke you myself. Sorry I didn't move faster. That's no kinda alarm clock."

Mac flashed him a quick grateful smile. "I appreciate that."

Nikki leaned forward over her laptop. "You don't get airsick, do you? I have some stuff in my purse."

Mac tried to think of something to say that didn't give him away while also acknowledging and declining her offer, but Jack beat him to it. "He's not likely to refund his lunch in here, Nik. Unless he spends too much time lookin' out the window. He just don't care much for flying. Our boy here's afraid of heights."

"Oh!" She laughed a little and Mac flushed brighter. "I had no idea …" The jet jostled again. Nikki reached for her bag. "I _do _get a little air sick. Ugh." She went back to work after swallowing some Dramamine.

"Where are we at?" Mac asked smoothly, letting Nikki here the total lack of concern he'd effortlessly faked.

"Over the Atlantic at the moment, kid." Jack paused, eyeing Mac's annoyed expression and dropping his voice so Nikki wouldn't pick it up. "Sorry I outed you on the heights thing, bud. I was just gettin' the vibe you didn't want her to know you were havin' one of your nightmares and it was all I could think of."

"It's okay." Mac's face relaxed. "You read me right. And it's not like the heights thing is all that easy to keep under wraps on missions anyway."

"How come you're worried about her knowing about your dreams?" Jack thought he knew but he also thought it wasn't a good thing and wanted Mac to maybe think about that for a minute.

Mac shrugged. "I mean, she'd ask questions and she's not cleared for …" Jack's expression called bullshit. "Fine … I don't want to talk about any of that stuff with her."

"Yeah?" One of Jack's eyebrows went up in a familiar expression. "I don't wanna pry, but …"

Mac shook his head with a little smirk. "Yes, you do. You always do."

"Well … now … hear me out." Mac shrugged. "You really wanna be sharing a bed with someone who you don't want to know about your life?"

Mac blushed crimson. "What makes you think I'm 'sharing a bed' with anyone?"

Jack smirked. "Your face every time you look at Nikki, that's what."

Mac's half smile said he was embarrassed that Jack knew, with his own transparency, but that he was pretty pleased with the fact itself, if not that it had gone public. "I mean, okay. Sure," he admitted. "But just because we've … you know … Doesn't mean I want her to know all my deepest darkest secrets." He glanced around Jack to be sure Nikki wasn't listening to them. "Don't look at me like that. You told your last girlfriend you sell bathroom tile," he scoffed.

Jack shook his head. "Fair enough. Just … I know how you are and …"

"How am I?" Mac asked a little defensively.

"If you've … I'm gonna just say _been close _like that with her, you're already half in love …"

"I'm not … What makes you say that?"

Jack grinned. "You're just … Mac. You've got this sense of honor and … you quote your grandad all the time … you sound a little old fashioned. And then there's …"

"What?" Mac asked, cocking an eyebrow, but not quite managing to be annoyed. Everything Jack was saying was true, even if he didn't want to admit it.

"Anytime we went on leave … Every chick from babysitters to their grandmas were throwin' themselves at you. You coulda pulled down more ass than a toilet seat at the Super Bowl."

"Jack!"

Jack chuckled at the slightly offended tone and the smack he'd just gotten on the arm. "See, kid, that's kinda what I'm talkin' about. You never did. Barely let any of 'em buy you a drink. You don't take anything about relationships lightly." He paused. This part was serious and he didn't want Mac to take it lightly or dismiss it because he'd been teasing him a little bit. "So if you're holding yourself at a distance from her, Mac, since you know she's read into the life, you maybe wanna slow down and ask yourself why."

Mac frowned at him. "You don't like her." He sounded more like the idea bothered him than that it pissed him off.

Jack shook his head. "I like her fine, bud. I just … something tells me she might not be real good for you."

"Like what?" he demanded.

"My spidey senses are tingling is all, kid."

"Nope. Not good enough. Specifics. What makes you think we're not gonna be good together."

Jack chewed the inside of his cheek for a moment. "I don't know exactly, Mac," he admitted. "But like … the other day when you invited her over for dinner so she could get to know Boze and Penny and we all went swimming …"

Mac's frown deepened. What could Jack be talking about. That had been a great night. They'd all gotten along great and had a nice time and … Nikki had looked amazing in that bright pink bikini and … "What about it?"

Jack sighed. He was probably making something out of nothing. But Mac was different around Nikki. And it worries him. A lot. "When we were all hanging out around the fire pit after, she commented on the scar on your knee."

"So what?" Mac shrugged.

"She said it was gross."

Another shrug. "It is a pretty gross scar. The surgery one isn't so bad, but the permanent road rash is kinda nasty."

"She must really not like the one from that bullet graze."

Mac shrugged again. "So what?" he asked again. But he knew what Jack was going to say.

"So after she said something you went and got dressed. You sat there in jeans and long sleeves while the rest of us hung out in swimsuits and even when we went back in the water."

Mac swallowed. That maybe wasn't great. "Maybe I was cold."

"Okay. Maybe you were. All I'm sayin' is, make sure it's good for you, that it's what you want. And not just parts of ya, kid." Jack tipped him a wink and laughed to break the seriousness of the moment.

Mac gave him a shove, laughing. "Jesus!"

"What're you two doing over there?" Nikki called, sounding amused.

"Nothin', Nik," Jack said with a charming grin.

"Jack's just reminding me what a gutter brain he can have sometimes."

"I don't even want to know," Nikki smirked.

Mac combed his hands through his hair again with a little sigh. He lowered his voice again. "I'll think about what you said."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. If you promise not to bring it up again."

Jack nodded. That was as good as he was gonna get. "Pinkie swear, Carl's Junior." Jack got up to go grab a drink.

Mac gave him a little nod and picked up his work tablet again. "Grab me a coffee while you're up, wouldja? I'm not getting back to sleep with the way this tin can is shaking anyways."

"You bet, kid. Better get caffeinated before we hafta go stop the zombie apocalypse."

Mac laughed. "You know Terminus does more than bio-research, right?"

"What else do they do?"

"All kinds of cutting edge research. Zombies are the least of your worries when we land, pal."

"Like what? Specifics," he said, mimicking Mac's earlier comment.

He grinned. "They're deep into AI. Half their lab work is done by robots."

"Sonovabich," Jack sighed. He headed toward the beverage cart mumbling about the robopocalypse.


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N - Sorry it's been a minute. I've had kind of a migraine thing going on. And I've been getting ready for the Vermont Sci-fi Fantasy Expo where I'm going to be a panelist this weekend. Hope you enjoy the update!_

_Wish me luck! ~ J _

The lab had every conceivable piece of tech known to man. Mac took in every shiny surface, every label, every cabinet and drawer, looking for something - anything - even slightly out of place from what he'd memorized.

Jack, clearly a nervous wreck about the fact that they were in a bio-research lab full of robots, was right on his elbow. "Maybe we shouldn't have left Nikki in the van," he whispered, side-stepping a robot on wheels carrying a tray of centrifuge vials.

"Why not?" Mac asked absently, leaning over to look at one of the computer displays running information.

"Look at all this stuff! She's our tech expert."

"You just want someone else between you and zombie germs." Mac snickered and shook his head. "She's our computer analyst. She doesn't have any more interest or expertise in this kind of lab tech than you do, pal."

Over the comms, Nikki's wry voice broke in. "Did you just compare my skill set to Jack's?" she asked with mock offense.

Mac only half heard her. He was frowning at an inventory sheet. "Mmmmm," was all he said.

"Mac!" Nikki prodded when he didn't respond as she expected.

"Well, you don't," he replied, not really paying attention. Jack stepped closer when he saw how Mac's frown was deepening.

"Neither do you, Mr. C in Biology," she huffed.

Mac grinned but didn't look up from what he was doing. "Just because I'm not interested in dissecting eyeballs or fetal animals doesn't mean I wasn't good a fixing lab equipment. My friend Frankie was a biology major and always said I was the best lab partner even though we didn't take any of the same classes other than organic chem at MIT. Because I could fix all the equipment."

"Yeah, well, if Frankie had ever seen you go all squeamy over reruns of House, he probably wouldn't have let you anywhere near his stuff."

Jack noticed Mac looking a little uncomfortable but didn't say anything. Mac replied stiffy, "Maybe. And you're brilliant at software, Nikki. I'm not trying to knock your skills. But they still don't make you any more expert than Dalton with this stuff."

She huffed loudly over the comms and Mac shook his head, smiling a little, and Jack thought he was looking like he thought he'd just dodged a bullet. Jack didn't say anything. If there was something Mac was keeping from Nikki Jack was more than willing to support that. He liked her alright but something about Nikki always made his spidey senses tingle a little.

Nikki interrupted his thoughts and Mac's. "At least I have the consolation of knowing you think my ass is cuter than his," she said, the edge of flirtation quite clear.

"That I do," Mac agreed absently. He made a face. It was one Jack had already come to think of as the _uh oh _face.

"What's wrong?"

He leaned against the counter. "Couple things. One, there's stuff on this inventory list that I haven't seen anywhere in the building."

"Maybe it got used up already," Jack our in hopefully.

"It's not consumable stuff. It's equipment."

"Oh, that's probably not good."

"Probably not," Mac agreed. "Also this run report right here." He indicated a scrolling spreadsheet sort of arrangement on the monitor in front of them. "It doesn't appear to go with any of the experiments here."

"What's it go with? It's zombies isn't it? It's zombies and you just don't want to say it out loud."

"I think it's safe to say no one is cooking the solanum virus here, Jack. But it doesn't go with anything. It's just randomly spitting out amino acid chains that don't actually go together."

"What do you think it means?"

Nikki chimes in over the comms. "Either somebody's up to something and they don't think the techs who pass through are going to notice the data doesn't mean anything or … there's a serious malfunction in all this automation."

"Exactly," Mac agreed. "Either way, given what Terminus handles regularly, it's not good."

"What exactly do they handle again, kid?"

Mac sent something to the printer and headed over to grab it as soon as it as ready. "Well, for one thing they handle identification and disposal for intelligence agencies when they stumble on suspected bio weapons or chemical nerve agents."

"Great," Jack said sarcastically.

Mac grinned. "Don't worry, Jack. I won't let the robots turn you into a zombie." He paused, letting his face look suddenly serious. "What'll they call it if the robopocalypse and the zombie apocalypse start simultaneously?"

Jack smacked him in the arm, pretty damn hard actually, "You're not funny!"

Mac rubbing his arm but cracked up anyway as Nikki laughed raucously over the comms. "He's definitely funny!" she supplied.

"See?" Mac grinned. "Nikki thinks I'm funny."

Mac had clearly noticed something else on a subconscious level even before his exceptionally nimble mind caught up, because he'd started moving again before his expression even changed. Once all of him was on the same page, his expression morphed into the creased forehead of intense problem solving.

He was typing something into another one of the computers and saying, "Hey, Nikki, can you pull up the building blueprints alongside the wiring schematic and send it to my tablet. Something's bugging me." One of the automated equipment transport robots bumped into him hard, almost knocking him off his feet. "Ow!"

He backed up against the counter as the robot shifted directions, reminding him of a very expensive Roomba. Jack eyed the retreating device warily. "I told you those things've got something against humans. Not so funny now that you're gonna have a big ole bruise to show for laughin' about it, is it?"

Mac, who had been absently massaging his leg where the thing bumped into him, stopped and shook his head. "I hate to admit it, pal, but those robots are actually what's bugging me at the moment."

"Now you're just pickin' on me again," Jack grumped.

Mac heard his tablet beep a split second before Nikki confirmed she'd gotten him what he asked for. He shouldered around Jack to get a look at it, remaking seriously. "Not teasing even a little." As he squinted at the tablet, he added. "How many of those little square guys giving you hives did you notice when we came in?"

"There's eight of 'em."

"Correction, there _were_ eight of them. Count again."

Jack turned and started doing exactly as Mac asked, looking for all the world like he was playing eeny meeny miney mo. "Well, shit … Maybe I counted wrong we we came in," he hedged.

"I don't think so, cause I made eight, too. And now there's only seven."

"Maybe we both counted wrong. None of them have gone in or out of the door and it's the only one. Plus that security lock is louder than a pushed off ex."

"We didn't count wrong. They're going somewhere, and they're not doing it by the main door. That's why I'm … Look! Here it is."

Mac set his tablet down on the counter and pointed at the wiring schematic. Jack stared at it like he actually thought that might help him see whatever it was that Mac had stumbled on. After a minute he gave up. "Do me a favor, kid, and just tell me what I'm lookin' at."

Used to having to fill Jack in on where his head was, especially with this kind of thing. "So the blue print shows the whole lab, all the square footage and capacity and outlets and all that right?"

"Yeah?"

"The the electrical schematic shows wiring and breaker boxes and all the power stuff. Still with me?"

"Sure."

"How come for a place this size with all this efficient equipment, there are extra breakers along that wall? And what looks like an active wiring job is just cut off on these plans?"

Jack frowned. "So … Too much electricity disappeared a robot?"

Mac smirked, just a little. "Kinda. I think the robot disappeared to wherever that power is actually going. And I'm pretty sure it's on that wall. Both of our backs were to it this whole time."

"A hidden room in the zombopocalypse lab? Great. Awesome. So glad your ginormous brain got us tapped for the mission, Mac."

Mac grinned at him. "Zombopocalypse, huh?"

Jack shrugged and tentatively smiled back. "Well, what else am I gonna call it? I didn't realize bein' your Overwatch meant I'd need to know the plural of apocalypse!"

Mac headed toward the suspect wall, clapping Jack on the shoulder on his way by. "Let's see if we can get to the bottom of this … You know, before we get past one apocalypse at a time territory."

Jack has to chuckle at that. _Nothin' rattles that, kid. Well, not nothin'. He was pretty rattled when we had to repel down off that damned mountain in Afghanistan. 'Course he was also bleedin' so I don't know if that counts. Even bein' actually afraid of something doesn't slow him down much though. _

He caught up to Mac who was crouched down sliding his fingers along seams in the stark white paneling and mumbling to himself. "Whatcha doin', kid?"

"Looking for where that other robot disappeared to. I'm betting it's behind this wall."

Jack nodded. It made as much sense as anything else. "What can I do to help? Poke around the wall, too?"

"Um … maybe, yeah." Something gave under his fingers. "Wait … no … help me with this." He indicated the panel he'd been exploring under one of the lab tables.

Jack groaned as he squatted down next to Mac and started trying to get his fingers under the edge of the panel Mac was focused on. After a couple of frustrating minutes and Jack nearly jumping out of his skin twice as robots rolled by them, Mac gave up trying to do things the hard way and remembered his pocket knife.

He was starting to get a little frustrated when the panel finally gave way and slid aside like an automatic elevator door. "Yes!" Mac leaned into the opening, ducking his head further to avoid bumping it on the lab table and the opening. Jack heard him grumble a half articulated curse.

"What's wrong, Mac. Were you wrong?"

Mac backed up and indicated that Jack could have a look. "Not exactly."

Jack crawled forward with some difficulty in the cramped space. He stuck his head into the hole in the wall and understood Mac's cussing. The dimly lit space revealed an access shaft. There was a square of light below the revealed the shaft at least went somewhere, and there were cables that suggested some sort of elevator or dumbwaiter type arrangement that was probably down at the bottom.

Which was roughly sixty feet below them.

"Oh, Mac, man. Sorry, but it looks like we're in for another rappelling adventure." He backed out so he could check in with Mac.

His young partner was already digging around in drawers and cabinets, looking for a way to get them down the shaft. "Um … yeah. Shouldn't be too hard. We've got some decent anchoring points and … yeah. I think I can go get the firehose from the other side of the lab to get us down there."

Jack stood and raised an eyebrow at him. "Here I thought you'd be worried about the climb, kid. You were usin' your Dalton vocab under that table. If it ain't the heights, what's eatin' you, Mac?"

Mac started to go after the hose, but he glanced over his shoulder at Jack. "Well, I'm not psyched about it, but I'm more concerned you might be right."

"Huh?"

"I don't like zombopocalypse … Does Zoboticgedon work for you?"

Nikki chimed in again, reminding them that they had a new team member listening to their comfortable banter.

"Okay, Jack is right. You are _not _funny, MacGyver."


	6. Chapter 6

The rope Mac improvised from the fire hose tied off to a lab table creaked and dropped them a few inches. Mac gasped and froze for a split second.

From below him Jack's unconcerned voice said, "You're okay, kid. The table just slipped is all. We figured that'd happen."

"Easy for you to say. You're closer to the ground," Mac mumbled.

"What was that, kid?" Jack called up, knowing exactly what Mac had said but hoping if he kept talking he'd feel a little better about their situation.

"I said, can you see anything yet?" Mac countered, making himself focus on the descent rather than the ground.

"Um …" Jack angled around, hanging down a bit to try to get a look at what was going on below him. He only had about ten feet to go anyway. "There's plenty of light. And some noise like wheels maybe. That's all I got."

"Nikki, you picking anything up with your sweep?" Mac asked.

No answer.

"Nikki?"

Nothing. _Huh. _Maybe this tunnel was too insulated for comms. Or something was jamming them. He looked down at Jack sort of instinctively to gauge his partner's reaction to their sudden lack of an analyst. _Ugh. At least twenty feet to go. Why does that feel so far?_

Jack dropped the last few feet into the floor. "Wonder if the Robot Legion of Doom is screwing with our comms."

Mac glanced down again. Less than ten feet. _Well, alright then. _He was about to respond when the "rope" jerked. Before he could think anything other than, "Oh, shit!" it let go.

It wasn't that far, and his landing hadn't really hurt, but as Mac started to pick himself up and look around he realized it was because Jack had broken his fall with … himself.

"You okay, pal?" Mac asked, starting to climb to his feet.

"You're a lot heavier than ya look, kid. Maybe I oughta quit tryin' to feed you all the time."

Mac smirked and offered Jack a hand up. "I'm gonna remember that the next time you start nagging me, old man."

Jack massaged his lower back, grimacing as he did so. Guilt about Jack's injury last year flashed across his young partner's face. "I'm fine," Jack said in a spot-on impression of Mac that made the kid flush. "Seriously though. Gun dug into me is all."

Mac smirked. His partner was definitely full of shit because Mac knew, with objective certainty, that Jack's back had bothered him off and on since the warehouse incident. And he knew what Jack said, but regardless, Mac felt responsible. "Okay, okay. Just sometimes I think it's good to remind you what _you _sound like."

"Brat," Jack snickered, then edged Mac behind him as he scoped out the hallway. Actually it was more of a tunnel than a hallway, wide but with extremely low ceilings.

Empty. _Huh._

After a minute he glanced over his shoulder at Mac, who was craning his neck trying to see around Jack anyway. "Doesn't look like there's anything … Wait … You hear that?"

Mac frowned and nodded. "Yeah … I think maybe I … It's … oh, no …"

"What?" Jack asked, eyes going a little wider.

"Sounds just like I always thought robot zombies would."

Jack smacked him lightly on the arm. "Dick … I'm serious."

Mac shrugged. "Just the same mechanical sounds we've been hearing. Only … weirdly further away."

"Actually, kid, I was thinkin' the same thing."

Caution was getting them nowhere. Mac darted around Jack and crouched down to start up the tunnel toward the sounds. Jack swore under his breath and was right behind his partner a second later, mumbling under his breath about not much caring for being about bent double a hundred feet underground with probable zombie robots.

About ten steps in, Jack noticed an incline to the floor. "Uh, Mac?"

"Yeah, I know," he whispered.

"The floor …"

"I know," he repeated. "Shh. Listen."

"I don't hear anything."

"I know. All the mechanical noise has gone quiet."

Mac looked around for a minute, then started sliding has hands along the wall. Jack followed, frowning. "What're we lookin' for, Mac?"

"Not looking; found," Mac replied as he crouched down, taking out his Swiss Army knife and sliding the blade into a seam on the wall. "I heard movement behind this …"

Jack got closer so he could see what Mac was up to. There was light down here, but it wasn't awesome. He couldn't help but smile at Mac's little under his breath exclamation of victory.

Mac pried off the panel revealing another access tunnel. "What do you think of this?" he asked over his shoulder.

"That it's just about the right size for one of those robot thingys and that damned tunnel looks like it goes on forever."

"Yeah, that's what I think, too." Mac looked around for a minute, not really at anything, just thinking. "Can you cover the entrance here and I'll head up here to see where this side tunnel goes."

"Mac …"

"I won't go far. I have an idea."

Jack sighed. "Alright. But not far. I don't want to face the zombopocalypse by myself, kid."

Mac grinned. "Still got my Swiss Army knife, pal. We're apocalypse proof."

Jack grinned back, managing to keep his anxiety about being underground in a bio research lab surrounded by robots mostly under wraps. "If you say so, kid. Hurry your ass up and get back here though."

Mac nodded his reassurance and headed up the dim little tunnel, crouching down to do so. Before long he came to a fork in the tunnel. It was dark in both directions. Mac held his breath for a moment, trying to create enough silence to hear the subtlest of sounds. He thought maybe he heard something off to the right.

He took out his phone and turned on the flashlight. He stretched his neck a little. He was stiffening up from all this crouching. It was unlikely to get better until he could stand up and stretch properly. He headed up the new tunnel.

He'd gone probably 20 more feet when it occurred to him that if he found what he was anticipating, he'd probably want back up. In truth they had enough to call in reinforcements from DXS already. He started to turn and head back out to talk it over with Jack and caught the flicker of a shadow just in time to flinch before there was a sharp pain at the back of his ear.

Out in the main hallway, Jack was getting antsier by the minute. Mac had been gone long enough. They should've just called the damned cavalry in when they found the entrance to the freaking Umbrella Corporation. Jack shivered as he pictured those spooky zombie dogs from the movie with that super hot chick joining forces with undead i robots.

He turned and leaned into the access Mac had disappeared up about ten minutes ago. "Mac! C'mon back now. You've been down that there rabbit hole long enough."

No answer. Jack grumbled under his breath for a minute about stubborn geniuses. Then he tried again. If their safety wouldn't get his attention, maybe reminding him that his girlfriend was out in the van would drag his ass back here.

"Mac! Dude! Let's head back up to the surface and make sure Nikki's all good, huh, kid?"

When he was met with silence again, he swore more audibly. Then he started mumbling about how he was going to drag Mac out of that tunnel by his ears and enjoy every minute of making him climb back up that … damn, it … he'd forgotten their robe broke until just now.

Well, they'd just have to do the Mac improvising thing.

He was ready to head into the tunnel after his partner, where he was pretty sure he'd about have to crawl in to fit, a very quiet voice spoke from right behind him. "If you'll just place that firearm on the floor, you may just make it out of here alive."

_Sonofabitch._


	7. Chapter 7

Jack glanced back over his shoulder at the woman behind him. She was not much younger than him, short, slender, pretty in an elfish sort of way, wearing a lab coat, and, perhaps most importantly, had a small gun leveled at his back. Her hands were very steady.

He was cursing a steady stream in his head, but all he let out of his mouth was, "You don't look much like the super-villain-secret-underground-lair type, Miss."

"Doctor," she corrected, but not sharply. "Dr. Alice Stomski. Who the Hell are you?" she demanded, but it still wasn't sharp, just calm and determined.

"My name's Jack," he began, keeping his hands where she could see them, but starting to turn toward her.

"Bup, bup, bup, bah. I didn't say you could move."

He stopped. "Dalton," he finished. "I work for a security firm looking into some suspicious activity." He paused, glancing over his shoulder again. "I'm guessin' that'd be you."

"You'd be guessing wrong," she said plainly, shaking her head so that her dark bobbed hair brushed her cheeks. He could see it out of the corner of his eye. He heard her sigh softly. "Although I suppose I may be responsible for it."

"How's that?" he asked, venturing to turn again. This time she didn't stop him.

"Well, I suggested these access tunnels be built so maintenance and other non-critical tasks wouldn't get in the way of our scientists. And I suggested that we start using AI for repairs and unskilled lab work."

She didn't lower her weapon, but Jack thought she was starting to look inclined. He lowered his hands slowly, to gauge her reaction. Her eyes were glued to his every move, but she didn't look trigger happy. "Those sound like smart ideas, not that I know much about smart lab geek stuff."

"Well, then what would you be doing investigating things here?" she asked sharply, looking just a little twitchier.

"I'm backing up the smartest guy I've ever met, that's what." Jack took a step toward her. "And right now he's up that tunnel and he ain't answerin'. So how're you responsible and what am I gonna get myself into when I go up there lookin' for him?"

She frowned. "Do you have ID?"

He shook his head. "Reach?"

"Go ahead."

Jack fished in his pocket and came up with a business card fold. He handed her one of the cards from inside. "If it'll get that toy you're wavin' around pointed somewhere else, you go ahead and call that number." A number was the only thing on the card.

"There's no signal down here. It's basically one big Faraday cage," she said, examining the card, but also lowering her weapon. She was getting the sense this guy was a professional, and while he looked dangerous around the eyes, she also had a sense that he wasn't dangerous to her. In fact, he might be the help she needed today.

"I'm gonna pretend I know what that even is and ask you again …"

"You don't want to go up that tunnel at all," she interrupted. "I'm only down here because I noticed some things going missing. Including a number of the bots. And then I noticed Five was missing, too. So, I think maybe someone reprogrammed my AI … or …"

"Or what?"

"Or they've gone off programming themselves." Jack swallowed hard at that. Back to the robopocalypse again. "And the other stuff that's missing is some genetically modified …"

"Nope. Don't want to hear it." Jack was past the point of being able to deal with the plural of apocalypse. He hadn't thought it was funny before when Mac was saying stuff like that as a joke.

One corner of her mouth lifted like she knew what he was thinking. "Well, whether it's Five … that's one of my robots … or someone who's up to no good with him, those tunnels are cramped. A guy your size would definitely be at a disadvantage in a fight in one of them."

"Well, my partner's not as big as me, but he ain't exactly small either, as I found out coming down here and being used as a human air bag," he offered without further explanation. "So I'm gettin' a little nervous about him not answering. And the more you talk, the more nervous I get."

She nodded. "There's a central storage room down here that the AI is programmed to head to to recharge once their task is done. There's an elevator back to the top in there, too. I suggest we start there."

Jack didn't see that he had anything to lose. She wasn't wrong about the proportions of that tunnel. He'd been worried he'd get stuck heading down it when she'd come up behind him. "Alright."

She gestured with her empty hand. "After you."

"I appreciate that, but 'ladies first if you don't 've clearly decided I'm reasonably trustworthy, but I haven't made up my mind about you just yet."

She simply shrugged at that point and started up the slight incline of the seemingly endless hallway with Jack right behind her.

0-0-0

It was dark.

It was cramped.

He felt a little bruised and scraped up, like maybe he'd been dragged.

And his head felt roughly like someone was banging symbols over his ears.

_What the …?_

Mac reached up to touch the most painful spot behind his ear, expecting to find blood, but instead feeling the edges of a fingerprint sized burn. "Sssst," he hissed.

Burns were the worst. And if anybody knew it, it was Mac. He was forever scorching himself on hot engine parts, or Bunsen burner flames, or heaven forbid, kitchen equipment, when he decided to try learning to cook for the millionth time.

The air felt close and stale, but it wasn't warm. In fact, Mac finally processed that he was shivering a little. _Weird. _

Then he remembered thinking it was cold in the tunnel right before … whatever left that burn behind his ear. The area was probably cooled for the electronics. Or … it was cold storage for biological material. _Knock it off, Mac. You sound like Jack_, he lectured himself silently.

He started feeling his way around the dark … closet? _Yeah, it feels like a closet. _He couldn't find a doorknob though.

After a couple of minutes, his real thoughts made their way through the headache and he got out his keys. There was a tiny LED on the key chain. He thought maybe if he ever upgraded his Swiss Army knife, he'd get one with its own flashlight and kinetic battery. The light from his keychain was a dim pale blue indicating the watch battery that powered it was getting low, but at least he could see a little bit now.

He was in a closet for sure. It's narrow walls stacked to well above his head with boxes of files and little else. He could see light seeping in around the rectangle in front of him, indicating a door, but he'd been right when he was feeling around in the dark. _No handle. Damnit._

He used the faint light to try to locate hinges but came up empty. He had the brief disquieting thought that it was like being in a coffin. _Now you really sound like Jack! _he groused at himself.

He realized that his body and his limbic system didn't care if his rational brain thought the thought was ridiculous because his heart was beating too fast and sweat was running down the center of his back in spite of the cold.

He opened the small, slightly sturdier, knife in his arsenal and began trying to pry the edges of the door open. He stopped when he heard a faint whirring sound right by the door.

He was suddenly, irrationally convinced that not only was he starting to sound like Jack, but that Jack was right about the robopocalypse.

The door rattled.

Then it shook,

Then it fell away off to the side.

Mac blinked in the light, trying to will his eyes into adjusting quickly so he could see what was going on. He fervently hoped that it was that Jack had found him.

When he was able to focus on what was in front of him, it wasn't Jack.

It was one of the short, squat robots that he'd first noticed wasn't where it belonged. A red light on top of it was blinking ominously.

Once again his own voice in his head sounded a little like his partner.

_Well, shit._


	8. Chapter 8

The squat little rectangle on wheels had an appendage that looked like a combination between a cigarette lighter and a taser. Thinking of the pain behind his ear and remembering a faint crackle before he blacked out, Mac dropped back a step.

The device rolled toward him a few inches, then backed up and made a soft beeping noise. Mac frowned. "Well, you don't sound dangerous, I guess."

It advanced toward him again and made a little whirring sound that seemed like an agreement.

Mac's apprehension melted and he felt his lips twist into a smile. "I just picked up my own R2 unit and Jack's not here to see it. He's gonna be pissed."

The small digital display on top flashed the number five. "Five? Five what?" Mac asked, then shook his head.

It's not like this thing could understand him. But like it _had_ understood, it rolled toward him, then away, then toward him again, and Mac got the impression that it was nodding at him. Then it made a couple or urgent beeping noises, and the number five flashed a few more times.

"Sorry little guy, I don't know what you …" He stopped. "Wait … Are you Five?"

The series of enthusiastic beeps that followed told Mac two things very clearly. One, this little box would answer to the name Five. And two, it definitely understood what he was saying to it.

"Wow. That kind of voice recognition software is really advanced. Somebody pretty smart programmed you."

Five agreed again. Mac stepped completely clear of the closet he'd been shut in. _Ow._ He'd definitely been dragged here. And maybe run into some stuff. He frowned at Five. "Did you put me in there?"

"No waaaaay," scrolled across the display screen and Mac gave a little snort of laughter. So whoever programmed this little guy wasn't just smart as hell, they had a sense of humor, too.

"I'm guessing you didn't zap me either, huh?"

It made a noise that almost sounded offended and Mac found himself chuckling again. He'd better not let Jack catch him chatting with R2-D5 like this or the Star Wars references would never stop. It then flashed the universal first aid symbol several times on its screen, the ubiquitous little red cross.

"Oh, no, not you, too," Mac chuckled. "I'm fine, thanks. Well … I'm annoyed and I need to find my partner and figure out what's going on down here. But other than that, I'm good."

A digital thumbs up blinked on the display. Another series of beeps combined with a flashing arrow signaled a clear message of "Follow me."

"Alright, Five. Lead the way."

The robot spun on its multidirectional castors and rolled across what appeared to be a storage room for old files and spare parts. It was poorly lit and dusty but that didn't seem to slow Five down.

Mac peered around at the boxes and stacks in the dim cavernous room. "Hey, Five, hang on."

The little bot stopped and turned around, almost like it was watching what he was doing. Mac was too busy to pay much attention, as he was pulling items out of the component boxes and talking to himself. Well, he was kind of talking to Jack. Mac had discovered over the course of recent missions that despite getting annoyed by Jack's incessant questions, he sort of found that explaining things to his partner helped him think as his plans evolved on the fly.

After a while, Five made an inquisitive series of beeps. "Just a minute, Five. I'm almost done." Some more beeping. "I'm making something to keep myself from getting zapped again."

Five extended a slender arm from its side and the small round tip sparked unmistakably.

"You did zap me!" Mac said in an accusatory voice that he probably would have found funny if he'd heard someone else using it on a squat little beeping box. Five made a slight whirring sound and rolled back away from Mac. "No? You're offering to zap someone else?"

An affirmative sound. Then the arm disappeared into Five's body again.

"I appreciate that, Five," Mac said, but still eyed the little machine warily. He filled his pockets with his thrown together (_I really hope these work or that I don't need them_) defenses. "Let's go … um … wherever you were going to take me."

Five rolled up to a wall panel and extended another appendage from inside its main box and plugged it into the keyhole beneath a keypad. A hidden door slid silently to the side. Mac hesitated for a second. He glanced up and down the low ceilinged hall and finding it empty, followed Five a second later.

Mac didn't have to duck, but only barely. He followed the robot for what felt like forever. He was thinking to himself that if Jack was wandering around down here, he must be getting a crick in his neck from crouching down.

Almost like the thought summoned him, Mac heard a thud and a mumbled curse from around the corner up ahead of them. "Jack?" He called softly.

"Mac?" Jack answered in his characteristic totally not soft voice. Then Mac heard another voice, a very pretty one, ask, "Your partner?"

Mac and Five rounded the corner. Mac skidded to a stop and put his hands up. A woman was leveling a gun right at his chest. "Whoa!" he began.

Jack stepped forward and threw her a very irritated glare. "Put that damned thing away. I told you that was Mac."

As she slipped the weapon into one of the pockets on her crisp lab coat, Mac lowered his hands with a grin. "Gotta tell you, pal, hearing you tell someone to put a gun _away_ is almost funny."

Jack closed the distance between them, still frowning, ignoring the little robot who almost tripped him up rolling toward the scientist at his back. He was aware of her very pleased exclamation of, "Five!" and of the fact that talking and typing on the keypad on the side of the robots head was happening, but mostly he was caught up on what the hell must have been happening with his partner in the last hour or so.

"Jesus, kid, what the hell happened to you?"

Mac shrugged. "I wish I could remember." Jack's frown deepened. "I was in the side tunnel, almost crawling along because it narrowed down pretty fast and something zapped me behind the ear."

"Zapped you?"

"Yeah, it's fine." Seeing that his assurance wasn't even semi-adequate he turned his head and brushed his slightly shaggy hair out of the way. "See, it's …"

"It looks like someone held a lit cigar to your head, kid."

Mac shrugged again. "Kinda feels like it, too. But I think the results are the least of our worries. Because I'm pretty sure one of that little guys siblings is responsible. And is clearly okay with violating Asimov's Laws of Robotics."

"Pretty sure you're right," the woman said, stepping toward him and extending a hand. "Dr. Alice Stomski."

"MacGyver." He shook the offered hand, but didn't elaborate when she cocked an eyebrow at him. He was familiar with the expression. At least she didn't follow it up with a comment about mononyms, he thought. "I take it Five belongs to you, Dr. Stomski?"

"He does." Mac didn't miss the affectionate _he _in her reply. Like the little robot was a favorite pet. "And feel free to call me Alice, since it seems like we may be in the middle of the robopacalypse together."

Mac grinned and raised his eyebrows at Jack. She caught the expression and he tried to cover it by clearing his throat. "That you programmed apparently, if that little guy belongs to you."

"Well, you're half right," she said with a sigh.

"Come again?"

"This little guy does belong to me. And actually I did the original programming on all 14 of the lab bots we developed. But Eric must've reprogrammed at least some of them if one of them injured you. Which I've been worried about for a while."

"Eric?" Jack asked. Mac's eyebrows lifted again, but since Alice had turned to answer Jack she missed him subtly teasing his partner about any compatibility or competition.

"One of the other scientists here."

"Oh."

"And my ex husband."

Mac didn't miss Jack's half smirk. She did say _ex._

"May I have a look at where you were …" She searched back through their conversation for his phrasing. "_Zapped_?"

Mac's eyes rolled involuntarily. "I guess."

He bent down slightly so she could see the burn behind his ear. "What have you been worried about?" Mac asked. "Just him reprogramming?"

"At first." She sighed. "I think 8 must have done this." Her tone was clipped, irritated.

Mac straightened back up. "You can tell which bot jumped me just by looking at my head?"

She was already working on the keypad on the side of Five again. "I can guess. 8 isn't an independent bot, more of a drone. Meaning Eric was probably piloting the bot remotely. Because I don't think one of the autonomous units could have been reprogrammed thoroughly enough to hurt a human."

Jack's frown was back in place. "Why would he want to do that? Either thing?"

Five started rolling away down the hall and Dr. Stomski started off right behind him. Mac and Jack fell quickly into step with Alice. "What happened with Eric?" Mac prodded gently.

"Well, both our proposals made it to the most recent final round with the board for funding. But mine was fully funded and his wasn't."

"And that led him to start the robopocalypse?" Jack asked.

"No. He wasn't really interested in my boys before."

"Alice?" Mac prompted. "What was his project?"

She frowned, but not at him. "He was looking into a new method of modifying viruses to improve vaccine research."

"Modifying viruses?" Jack asked, his face the picture of blank horror.

Mac sighed. "And let me guess, you were down here in the maintenance area to begin with because something's gone missing?"

She nodded. "Several somethings."

Mac chewed his lip. "Okay. I think I have an idea, but I'm gonna need a few things."

"You gonna tell me you know how to stop the zombie apocalypse and the robopacalypse all at once?" Jack asked, daring to feel hopeful. He even flashed a grin at Alice when she arched an eyebrow at his phrasing.

Mac grinned. "I already have the robopacalypse in the bag. Need a few items to keep us out of World War Z."

Alice took out a large set of keys from the pocket of her lab coat. "What do you need?"


	9. Chapter 9

The trio crept along carefully, approaching the large door at the end of the tunnel, followed by Five who occasionally beeped softly.

"Five, quiet," Mac whispered.

Off to his side, Jack snickered. "You sure his name isn't really R2, young Skywalker?"

Mac shook his head. "I knew you were gonna start."

"Yeah well, I'd rather think about getting eaten by Ewoks than like robot zombie clowns or whatever is down here."

"The Ewoks don't eat people, Jack. I don't know how many times I'm gonna have to explain this to you…"

Dr. Stomski pushed between them. "Are you two seriously arguing about Star Wars right now?"

"No!" Jack said, clearly offended. "We're arguing about Return of the Jedi!" Jack launched into an explanation of an argument that went all the way back to Afghanistan.

"Shhh!" Mac interrupted suddenly, holding up a hand. "Do you hear that?"

Once they were quiet, they heard it too. At first when you just listened, it was a low humming. Then you realized you could feel it, too. Kind of vibrating in your chest. It gave a feeling of unease.

"Place sounds haunted," Jack whispered.

Mac frowned. "Do you think your ex might have some kind of wireless charging system down here? For the robots?"

"He might. Why?"

"Jack is right. It sounds haunted. Which probably means a high level of certain types of electromagnetic frequencies. Same sort of stuff so called ghost hunters usually find in supposedly haunted houses."

"You can't prove they aren't really haunted…"

"Jack, you can exactly prove it. That's the whole point of using EMF detectors."

"One of these days, Mac, you're gonna run into something you can't explain and then you'll…"

"Sure, pal." Mac grinned to let him know he was teasing.

"Does it matter?" Alice asked, trying to get the pair back on track.

"Well, if that's what it is, I can probably take out all the bots are once. If I can get in there and access the power unit. Any ideas?"

She paused, thinking about it. "There's the maintenance access. But it's mostly meant for repair robots." She squinted at him. "You might be able to squeeze through."

Jack stepped forward. "Good. So we'll go in through the maintenance whatever and you can guard the door with that cute little pistol of yours if the ex is down here and makes a break for it."

"You're not going to fit through there, big fella. Your partner there might or might not get stuck."

"Well, listen…"

"Jack." It was all Mac had to say. If Mac was almost too big, Jack probably couldn't even get started.

Jack cleared his throat. "So we get Mac access to the wiring junk and when he says go, you and me breach the door?"

Mac tipped him a grin. "And by me saying go, you mean gives you the signal?"

"Yeah, exactly."

"Alright, give me a hand with this access panel."

Jack stepped forward to do just that.

As soon as Mac disappeared into the maintenance access, Alice asked, "What's the signal?"

Jack shrugged. "No idea. I'll know it when I see it."

She rolled her eyes. Based on their banter up to that point, she should have known. "Great."

0-0-0

Mac crawled along through the narrow space. He caught and tore his clothing several times, but did manage not to get stuck. He was estimating the distance in his head, but some the increased vibrating feeling he had in his chest he was pretty confident in his estimate.

He got out his pocket knife and carefully unscrewed the back side of the access panel. He eased it out of his way slowly, wincing at every little whispering scrape it made as he set it aside.

He edged out into the dim, freezing room. He rapped his head on the lab table that was in his way and he almost swore out loud, but he heard a chair scrape across the floor. Mac bit back his irritated, pained exclamation and slid into the shadow of a nearby cabinet.

He watched from his nearly invisible vantage point. A tall, slender man in glasses and a lab coat, who definitely didn't look like the supervillain type, moved around the crowded storage room. For an underground storage space there was a lot of extremely high tech equipment down here. And it was very clean.

But some stuff was just cobbled together the way Mac might have done it himself.

There was a refrigeration apparatus built out of styrofoam, coolers, and an air conditioning unit with the temperature regulator broken off and there were little charging stations under four robots that resembled Five, that seemed to be thrown together out of homemade solenoids, and some radio parts.

That was a relief. He didn't want to use his improvised solution to the robot problem. If he could cause a surge through the power units, he could probably neutralize the drone bots.

He crept from unit to unit, doing just that.

He got around to the last unit, the most dangerous one since it was closest to the desk the man was working at. He accessed the wiring carefully, pulled the critical wire out and moved to snip it. The wire sparked.

And the whole room went dark.

He heard the rogue scientist swear. Then something got knocked over. Then a flashlight was shining directly in his eyes.

_Damn._

_0-0-0_

Outside the room in the tunnel, things went dark.

Jack stiffened.

Alice turned on her phone's flashlight. "Lemme guess. The signal?"

"I guess maybe."

They tried the door.

Locked. And on close inspection it appeared to be an electromagnetic lock.

Alice frowned and tried opening it with something from her pocket.

A gunshot echoed from behind the door.

"Stand back, Doc," Jack said as he pushed her out of the way.

"Don't…"

Jack didn't let her finish the warning, he fired his weapon at the lock.

The round ricocheted off the bulletproof surface.

"Ah!" Jack recoiled and grimaced. The ricochet has grazed his forearm, a pretty deep gouge, too. Then, "Mac!"

0-0-0

Inside the room, Mac struggled with Eric Stomski. He couldn't hear a damn thing over the ringing in his ears from the gun firing in such close quarters. He knew the man was growling things at him, but it's not like anything he said mattered anyway.

Mac managed to knock the gun away. He kept catching brief glimpses of his adversary and the room from half broken flashlight getting kicked around at their feet.

He had just enough time to catch movement out of the corner of his eyes before a painful electric jolt to his thigh caused his leg to buckle.

_Welcome to the party, killer robot, _he thought, suddenly sympathetic to Jack's dislike of the technology.

He kept his feet, but just barely.

A second _zap; _his leg went numb and he went sprawling.

Stomski scrambled for his gun in the dark.

The robot rolled toward Mac again and he decided that was the bigger immediate threat. He pulled the improvised electromagnetic pulse device he'd constructed in the storeroom earlier out of his jacket, said a momentary prayer of sorts to Nicola Tesla, and triggered the device.

The machine went still, which was good.

But now Stomski was standing over him with his retrieved weapon. _Not great._

Fortunately, his EMP had also disengaged the door lock and Jack and Alice burst in. Without hesitation, Jack fired, and Stomski's gun went flying, as the man dropped to his knees, clutching his bullet-shattered hand.

Alice moved carefully into the dim room, surveying what her ex husband had been up to, as Jack zip tied the man's hands. Her phone light had gone dead when the lock disengaged.

"You okay kid?"

Mac couldn't hear distinct words yet, but knew Jack had spoken. Guessing at the content, Mac grinned. "Never better, pal."

His leg was still pretty numb, but the pins and needles feeling zinging up and down it told him it wouldn't be for very long. He used the table nearest him to pull himself up. Then he fished around in his pockets until he found a lighter. He flicked it to life for some light.

"Jack! You're bleeding!" His own voice still sounded underwater but his hearing was coming back.

"Aw, this? This ain't…"

"Hardly a mosquito bite. I know." He raised an eyebrow. "Hey, doc? Can I get you to part with that lab coat?"

She stripped it off. "Sure. What're you going to do with it?"

"Well, first I'm gonna make a torch with some of the lubricant oil on this table. Then I'm gonna bandage you my partner so we can get outta here and find our analyst." He handed her the lighter and she flicked it back to life so he could see to work.

"Maybe there's signal somewhere down here and we could just call for the cavalry," Jack said hopefully.

Mac shook his head, but kept working. "Even if there were, my EMP device fried our phones."

"Dammit, Mac! You've already wrecked like four of my phones for your little doohickeys on one op or another. Now you've figured out how to do it without even touching it!"

"Sorry, Jack," he said, not especially sounding it. He'd done what he needed to do. And everybody was still alive. He grinned as they got his torch lit. "How about I'll buy you a bottle of whatever the hell hard stuff you want to make it up to you."

"And a new phone!"

"And a new phone … Now, lemme see that arm."

He stepped toward Jack and his leg buckled just a little. Jack jumped to keep him from going over, but Mac had already steadied himself. "What the hell happened to you?" Jack demanded, but let Mac begin bandaging his bullet graze.

"One of Stomski's bots zapped me. A couple of times. That's why I zapped everything else."

Jack was about to respond, but first Alice exclaimed, "Five!" and that was followed almost immediately by Mac swearing a Jack worthy curse. "The containment unit!"

Alice ran and into the hallway and Mac half ran half limped across the room toward the now still and silent cooling unit he'd noticed earlier.

"Great move, Junior," Stomski said snarkily from his position on the floor where Jack had zip tied him to the desk.

Mac tossed a glare at him. "Don't suppose you've got a back up kinetic battery charger floating around down here?"

The man's expression lost some of its defiant angry edge. "If I did I'd tell you. I'm not looking to die down here."

Mac swallowed hard. "Me either. And I'm not looking to let it out either."

"If I help, I want a deal."

Mac wasn't sure what he was going to say but he opened his mouth anyway. Alice strode back in, interrupting. "No deals for you, Eric!" She could barely look at him. She did look at Mac and there was pain in her eyes. "There's liquid nitrogen down here somewhere. I know the surplus is in storage."

"No! You can't destroy my research!" Eric shouted.

Mac ignored him. "Where?"

"One of the two rooms further down the hall. I don't know which."

"I'll be back." He grabbed the torch and took off.

Now Mac's leg was waking up a little. And it didn't feel great. But he could run again halfway decently. He skidded to a stop in the hallway. "Oh, Five. I'm sorry," he said quietly when he saw the dark screen on the little robot's face. Then he took off down the hall.

When he got back about fifteen minutes later, wearing heavy gloves and lugging a surprisingly heavy tank, his torch was burning out, but someone had made a lantern of sorts with some of the oil. Jack was pacing and mumbling about being caught underground with a zombie virus and a chick named Alice and how devil dogs were probably going to chase them any minute, and Alice and her ex were arguing.

Mac did his best to just stay focused. Ideally, he'd introduce the liquid nitrogen without really opening the unit. He looked it over and realized there was no way to do it as safely as he wanted to. "Jack! I need extra hands," he called.

They got a small cover pried open and Mac handled the tank, dumping the contents into the box Eric had been storing his engineered virus. When the vapor poured out as the liquid nitrogen froze everything it touched, Jack yelped and jumped back.

"It's the chemical, Jack, not the virus escaping or whatever."

"You sure? Cuz I don't wanna get home and realize I'm the reason Captain Tripps infects Southern California."

"I don't know what that is, but trust me, you won't go home infected."

"Yeah? You're that sure this'll work?"

Mac shrugged, putting down the tank and peeling off his flannel shirt to make another torch they could use to get out of here. "Well, I'm at least sure that once we get topside and call this in, in addition to cops, Thornton's going to have this place crawling with infectious disease people. We won't get exfil until we're in the clear."

"Aw, man."

"Don't start freaking out. You need a medic anyway. How did you get shot? I didn't think Stomski got a shot off at you."

Alice had stopped lining out her husband and joined them. "Jack tried shooting the lock when he heard a shot from in here."

"Bulletproof?"

"Yup."

"Damn."

"And we're leaving that out of the report."

"Okay by me. So long as you write up the whole thing and I don't have to do any of the paperwork on this one."

"Rock, paper, scissors."

"Not a chance."

"Alright. Let's grab the mad scientist and get the hell out of here."

Mac lit the torch. "The sooner the better."


End file.
